The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1887-04-15
A SAURIAN PET.
Some Interesting Facts About the
Florida Chameleon.
The Old Notions Exploded About the Little
Animal Changing His Color at VIII,
and Living on Air-DesPerate
Fight.

and Living on Air-Desperate
Fight.
The Florida chameleon is the gentlest
and prettiest of saurians. 1t is a saying
in the South that this little creature is
an exact reproduction of the alligator
on very diminutive scale, but this is
not true. The flat head and leaden
eyes of the alligator are not reproduced
in the chameleon, though in other
respects the likeness is very close. The
chameleon's head is narrow, its mouth
innOcent-looking, and its eyes sparkle
like diamonds
But if the chameleon and alligator
are closely similar in shape, they are
widely different in size. An alligator
twelve or fourteen feet in length. sun
ming himself on sand-bar, and cham
eleon three or four inches long, taking
a siesta on an orange leaf, afford a con-
trast so striking that they are not likely
to be mistaken for twin-brothers.
Sometimes, however, chameleons are
mistaken by strangers for young alli-
gators.
In railway car that was whirling
through the Florida pine woods, last
winter, a chameleon awakened great
deal of curiosity IN number of boy
and girl passengers from the North, by
descending upon the window-pane to
the cherTy-red sill, and looking them
over with its sparkling brown eyes.
| BY accident or design, the little Great
ure's color was at that moment quiet
drab. After discussing it for some time,
the young people came to the conclu-
sion that it was an infant alligator.
Meanwhile, the chameleon had darted
where little Cracker" girl had taken
it in her hand and adorned its neck
with bit of red yarn from her hood.
''What is it, little girl ?'' one of the
party asked.
yarn" said she.
''He means what's the ANIMAL" an
other of the young Northerners ex-
planned.
This yer?' she asked, with surprise,
pointing to the little creature. ''Why,
that's er cumeelyum!
heinterest of the young Northerners
now became greater even than it had
been. They had always regarded cha
meleOns and salamanders as among the
most wonderful things in the world
chameleons with their gift of being able
to change their color to that of the OBJ
| ject on which they happened to be rest
ing, and salamanders, with their fond
ness for skipping about among live
Goals and darting flames.
Yet here was q genuine chameleon
that did not become red when it halted
on the cherry window-sill, and did not
turn green when it rested on the
| Cracker girls frock, but with an ap-
| pearance of disregard for the most
striking thing told about it in the story
books, preserved its modest drab
through all these vicissitudes. But,
however useful rs a sanitary precaution,
or appropriate from an artistic point of
| view, it might be for chameleons to
change their color to match their i'm
mediate surroundings, there is no suffi-
cient season for believing that the fac
ulty of doing so is possessed by them.
Naturalists favor the theory that the
changes of color are the result of ten
sion or relaxation of the fibrous muscles
| in the skin, by which the minute
scales are so arranged that the pre-
dominating tint reflected from them is
red, green or neutral, according to the
arrangement.
Whether this muscular action is vol
untary or involuntary, nobody knows.
So it can not be settled at present
whether chameleon turns green for
the reason that he prefers to be green,
simply because he happens to have
! done something that incidentally makes
chameleons green. But after all the
| theorizing, it is a fact that a chameleon
found ON lily-pad is more likely to be
| green than red, and that one found on
the bark of a tree is more often of a
neutral tint than either red or green.
There is another thing told about
chameleons that would be very inter
esting if it were true-that they eat
nothing but air. But it isn't true.
| Chameleons are not heavy eaters, and
they arc very irregular about taking
their meals. 1t is fortunate for them
that they have to devote but little at
tention 10 their eating, because they
are able to give all the more attention
to the important work of keeping them
selves from being eaten. Their food
consists mainly Of flies and the smaller
insects Of the air.
There is about the same appearance
Of reason for the statement that cha
neleons live on air that there is for
the story that they partly hide them
selves by making their color conform
to that Of the substance next to them.
Certainly they do make tremendous
show Of devouIing air. Some of the
African and South American varieties
initiate themselves clear to the tips Of
their tails. so that their shape is some
what like that of a kid-glove finger
blown up. But the Florida chaneleons
do not put on such airs. When they
are inflated, they simply look rs though
their tonsils were badly swollen. Why